Bag of Bones

From Barnes & Noble

The Barnes & Noble Review
In all of Stephen King's enormous body of writing, some of his best works have featured authors as protagonists. Among these, the chilling The Dark Half, the utterly creepy Desperation, and Misery, a true masterpiece, stand out. His new book, Bag of Bones, which revolves around bestselling thriller author Mike Noonan, can now be added to this list. Bones is a hauntingly beautiful novel that will touch your heart as easily as it tingles your spine. It has elements of classic King horror, but it's also something of a departure, as the author explores a few areas of the human mind and heart that are rarely significant roles in horror fiction. The result is an exceptional and excitingly original novel that is destined to take its place among King's most memorable.

Critics have said that Bag of Bones represents a more mature Stephen King. Real King fans know that he has been writing some of literature's most mature works since publishing The Dead Zone, but it's true that in this novel he displays a heightened emotional sensibility — which undoubtedy widens his appeal to an even larger audience. Die-hard King fans should rest assured that Bag of Bones doesn't skimp on the fear; quite the contrary. It offers up a horror that's very much in the tradition of The Green Mile: it's a softly dazzling, beautiful, almost quiet sort of horror that that creeps in a little more slowly but then takes a lot longer to leave your system. Bag of Bones is a haunting chiller — not only scary but melancholy as well. Itcontainssome truly heart-wrenching scenarios, among them the protagonist's grieving over the unexpected loss of his wife, who has the unfortunate distinction of being knocked off in the book's first paragraph.

On a very hot day in August of 1994, my wife told me she was going down to the Derry Rite Aid to pick up a refill on her sinus medicine prescription — this is stuff you can buy over the counter these days, I believe. I'd finished my writing for the day and offered to pick it up for her. She said thanks, but she wanted to get a piece of fish at the supermarket next door anyway; two birds with one stone and all of that. She blew a kiss at me off the palm of her hand and went out. The next time I saw her, she was on TV. That's how you identify the dead here in Derry — no walking down a subterranean corridor with green tiles on the walls and long fluorescent bars overhead, no naked body rolling out of a chilly drawer on casters; you just go into an office marked 'Private' and look at a TV screen and say yep or nope.

It's the delicate touch he shows here that has some previously unfriendly critics singing King's praises. The understatement and subtlety with which he traces and then fleshes out Mike's agony at the death of his wife early on in the book bespeaks a writer who is masterfully in control of his voice and narrative. This is not a story where a lot can be given away before hand — much of the pleasure of reading it is in the unusual and often surprising way it unfolds.

To give a very general idea of the plot though, the death of Mike's wife pulls him into a mystery that brings him to Sara Laughs, the summerhouse that he shared with his wife. At Sara Laughs, Mike finds himself involved in a disturbing child custody tug-of-war that erupts into a terrifying battle between forces of good and evil, present in both earthly and unearthly forms.

Without question Bag of Bones is ambitious. There's plenty of all-out terror here to satisfy his existing fan base, but there's also a truly touching love story that will appeal to many readers who have not given King a try since his early pure-horror days. In sustaining these two very different currents, and seamlessly combining them into one brilliantly crafted story, King has created one of his most expansive and artistically successful works — it's a great novel for long-time fans and newcomers alike.
—Matt Schwartz

People Magazine

Bag of Bones proves that King is as seductive a storyteller as ever, pulling his readers along as he explores the hidden evils of small-town America.

Christopher Lehmann-Haupt

Bag of Bones gets off to a most promising start....impressive as it may be, the story leaves you with the feeling that it is an afterthought [to avoid] whatever the novel's subject started out to be....In a typically outsized performance by Mr. King, this ambivalence toward his craft pervades mysteriously.
— The New York Times

James Bowman

. . .[T]he quality of [King's] writing is considerably less than tremendous. . . .Even at the level of basic metaphor King almost invariably disappoints. . . .Nor is there must to admire in the story of the blocked writer. . . .[his] prose is not close enough to the standard we ought to expect of literary artifacts that aspire to be taken seriously.
—National Review

Alex Tresniowski

. . .[T]he chillmaster seems to have tired of telling ghost stories. . . .Its focus divided, Bonesonly hints at the potent, romantic lyricism a redirected King might achieve.
—People

Newsweek

This is King's most romantic bookand ghosts are up and about from the get-go...The big surprise here is the emotional wallop the story packs.

James Bowman

...[T]he quality of [King's] writing is considerably less than tremendous....Even at the level of basic metaphor King almost invariably disappoints....Nor is there much to admire in the story of the blocked writer....[his] prose is not close enough to the standard we ought to expect of literary artifacts that aspire to be taken seriously.
— National Review

Daniel Mendelsohn

King the master of horror seems to be at war [here] with King the novelist of people and their ordinary lives....Inevitably, the everyday and the supernatural levels turn out to be connected....in the end, [Bones] can't decide whether it wants to be a serious work of literary fiction or a horror blockbuster.
— The New York Times Book Review

Tom DeHaven

Whenever you're positive — just positive — you know where this ghost story is heading, that's exactly when it gallops off in some jaw-dropping new direction.Entertainment Weekly

Newsweek

This is King's most romantic book, and ghosts are up and about from the get-go...The big surprise here is the emotional wallop the story packs.

Alex Tresniowski

...[T]he chillmaster seems to have tired of telling ghost stories....Its focus divided, Bones only hints at the potent, romantic lyricism a redirected King might achieve.
— People Magazine

Kirkus Reviews

Leaving Viking for the storied literary patina of Scribner, current or not, King seemingly strives on the page for a less vulgar gloss. And he eases from horror into romantic suspense, while adding dollops of the supernatural. The probable model: structural echoes of Daphne du Maurier's Rebecca, do sound forth, although King never writes one paragraph herein to match du Maurier's opening moonscapes of Manderley. What comes through nevertheless is a strong pull to upgrade his style and storytelling in this his 50th year. Yes, he actually does write better if with less energy and power than in Desperation (1996). In fact, attacking the race problem in lily-white Maine, he even assumes an almost Dreiserian seriousness in his final paragraphs. Well, the story: romantic-suspense novelist Michael Noonan, who summers in Castle Rock on Dark Score Lake, falls into a four-year writer's block when his wife Johanna dies of a brain blowout. Now 40 and childless, Mike has salted away four extra novel manuscripts in his safe-deposit box, one of them 11 years old (shades of Richard Bachman!), and keeps up a pretense of productivity by publishing a "new" novel each year. Meanwhile, he finds himself falling for Mattie Devore, a widowed mother half his age. Mattie's late husband is the son of still-thriving half-billionaire computer king Max Devore, 85 years old and monstrous, who plans to gain possession of Mattie's three-year-old daughter, the banally drawn Kyra. Mike's first big question: Did Johanna cuckold him during his long hours writing? If so, will her character reverse our understanding of her, as does Rebecca de Winter's? And how can he help Mattie fight off Max andkeep Kyra? The supernatural elements, largely reserved for the interracial climax, are standard King but fairly mild. Philosophically limited but a promising artistic shift for a writer who tried something like this with 1995's failure, Rose Madder.

From the Publisher

What I admire most about Bag of Bones is its intelligence of voice, not only the craftsmanship — the indelible sense of place, the well-fleshed characters, the unstoppable story line — but the witty and obsessive voice of King's powerful imagination. It places both the ghost story and Stephen King in their proper place on the shelf of literary American fiction." — Amy Tan

"Bag of Bones is, hands down, King's most narratively subversive fiction. Whenever you're positive — just positive! — you know where this ghost story is heading, that's exactly when it gallops off in some jaw-dropping new direction." — Entertainment Weekly